Nehemiah 6
6
Nehemiah’s Enemies Continue to Oppose the Rebuilding
1Sanballat, Tobiah and Geshem, the Arab, heard about what I had done. So did the rest of our enemies. All of them heard I had rebuilt the wall. In fact, they heard there weren’t any gaps left in it. But up to that time I hadn’t put up the gates at the main entrances to the city. 2Sanballat and Geshem sent me a message. They said, “Come. Let’s talk with one another. Let’s meet in one of the villages on the plain of Ono.”
But they were planning to harm me. 3So I sent messengers to them with my answer. I replied, “I’m working on a huge project. So I can’t get away. Why should the work stop while I leave it? Why should I go down and talk with you?” 4They sent me the same message four times. And I gave them the same answer each time.
5Sanballat sent his helper to me a fifth time. He brought the same message. He was carrying a letter that wasn’t sealed. 6It said,
“A report is going around among the nations. Geshem says it’s true. We hear that you and the other Jews are planning to turn against the Persian rulers. And that’s why you are building the wall. It’s also reported that you are about to become their king. 7People say that you have even appointed prophets to make an announcement about you. In Jerusalem they are going to say, ‘Judah has a king!’ That report will get back to the king of Persia. So come. Let’s meet together.”
8I sent a reply to Sanballat. I said, “What you are saying isn’t really happening. You are just making it up.”
9All of them were trying to frighten us. They thought, “Their hands will get too weak to do the work. So it won’t be completed.”
But I prayed to God. I said, “Make my hands stronger.”
10One day I went to Shemaiah’s house. He was the son of Delaiah. Delaiah was the son of Mehetabel. Shemaiah had shut himself up in his home. He said, “Let’s go to God’s house. Let’s meet inside the temple and close the doors. Some men are coming at night to kill you.”
11But I said, “Should a man like me run away? Should someone like me go into the temple just to save his life? No! I won’t go!” 12I realized that God hadn’t sent Shemaiah. Tobiah and Sanballat had hired him. That’s why he had prophesied lies about me. 13They had hired him to scare me. They wanted me to commit a sin by doing what he said. That would give me a bad name in the community. People would find fault with me and my work.
14You are my God. Remember what Tobiah and Sanballat have done. Also remember the prophet Noadiah. She and the rest of the prophets have been trying to scare me. 15So the city wall was completed on the 25th day of the month of Elul. It was finished in 52 days.
Nehemiah’s Enemies Oppose the Completed Wall
16All our enemies heard about it. All the nations around us became afraid. They weren’t sure of themselves anymore. They realized that our God had helped us finish the work.
17In those days the nobles of Judah sent many letters to Tobiah. And replies from Tobiah came back to them. 18Many people in Judah had promised that they would be faithful to him. That’s because he was Shekaniah’s son-in-law. Shekaniah was the son of Arah. Tobiah’s son Jehohanan had married Meshullam’s daughter. Meshullam was the son of Berekiah. 19Tobiah’s friends kept reporting to me the good things he did. They also kept telling him what I said. And Tobiah himself sent letters to scare me.
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Nehemiah 6: NIrV
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Nehemiah 6
6
Nehemiah 6
1¶ Now it came to pass when Sanballat and Tobiah and Geshem, the Arabian, and the rest of our enemies, heard that I had built the wall and that there was no breach left in it (though at that time I had not set up the doors upon the gates),
2that Sanballat and Geshem sent unto me, saying, Come, let us meet together in one of the villages in the plain of Ono. But they had thought to do me evil.
3And I sent messengers unto them, saying, I am doing a great work so that I cannot come down; why should the work cease, whilst I leave it and come down to you?
4Yet they sent unto me four times after this sort, and I answered them after the same manner.
5Then Sanballat sent his slave to say the same thing for the fifth time with an open letter in his hand,
6in which was written, It is reported among the Gentiles, and Gashmu saith it, that thou and the Jews think to rebel, for which cause thou dost build the wall, that thou may be their king, according to these words.
7And thou hast also appointed prophets to preach of thee at Jerusalem, saying, There is a king in Judah! And now these words shall be heard by the king. Come now, therefore, and let us take counsel together.
8Then I sent unto him, saying, There are no such things done as thou sayest, but thou dost feign them out of thine own heart.
9For they all made us afraid, saying, Their hands shall be weakened from the work, that it not be done. Now, therefore, O God, strengthen my hands.
10¶ Afterward I came in secret unto the house of Shemaiah, the son of Delaiah, the son of Mehetabeel, who was shut up; and he said, Let us meet together in the house of God, within the temple, and let us shut the doors of the temple; for they are coming to slay thee; yea, tonight they will come to slay thee.
11Then I said, Should such a man as I flee? And who is there as I who could go into the temple and live? I will not go in.
12And I perceived that God had not sent him, but that he pronounced this prophecy against me, for Tobiah and Sanballat had hired him.
13For he was bribed to make me be thus afraid and sin and that they might have matter for an evil report, that they might reproach me.
14My God, think thou upon Tobiah and Sanballat according to these their works and on the prophetess Noadiah and the rest of the prophets, that did things to put me in fear.
15¶ So the wall was finished the twenty-fifth of Elul, in fifty-two days.
16And it came to pass, that when all our enemies heard of it, all the Gentiles that were about us feared, and they were much cast down in their own eyes, and they knew that this work was wrought of our God.
17Likewise, in those days the principals of Judah sent many letters unto Tobiah, and the letters of Tobiah came unto them.
18For there were many in Judah sworn unto him, because he was the son-in-law of Shechaniah, the son of Arah; and his son Johanan had taken the daughter of Meshullam, the son of Berechiah.
19They also reported his good deeds before me and uttered my words to him. And Tobiah sent letters to put me in fear.
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The Jubilee Bible 2000 (JUB) by Ransom Press International